I,too,noticed the inside-out shirt and knew he’d probably dressed himself. And indeed it is “O.K. He is such a beautiful uninhibited child, so genuine. He seems like he never met a stanger or someone he dislikes. And in nearly every pictire of him with other children, the girls are always smiling at him. This may give you and Fumie some anxiety when he becomes a teenager. Your mother is speaking from experience.

Great blog, love the care and attention you pay on the images! Thanks!

I’m in love with the 70-200VR and am ordering it to complement my 18-200.

I was intrigued by your comment that you use the 17-55 f2.8 instead of the 18-200 on a daily basis…can you say more, why? I would think the longer zoom would be better to crop out background, even on a fast-moving kid.

I would have never thought I’d abandon the 18-200, but the extra aperture (2/3rd of a stop at 18mm, and 4/3rd stop at 55mm) and better build quality are just too good to pass up. I do hate to change lenses, which is a bummer, but if I want to go to 200mm, I almost certainly don’t want to give up even more max aperture, so I would likely switch to the 70-200 anyway.

Have you looked at the new 14-24 f2.8?

Mildly, but unless I get a D3 it appears to offer little over the 17-55. However, since the 17-55 is DX, the 14-24 makes a lot of sense for the D3. —Jeffrey

of course 18-55 doesn’t have 2.8. my point is those pictures are not that good, especially under the bright light. 18-55 can take the same picture with no problem(different f of course). the purpose is taking a good picture. if just for big f, f/1.8 or f/1.4 50mm would do better job than “your proud super” 17-55. it’s outdoor and under the sun light.

I’m searching for a reason why you’d want to come and put words onto my post (I never said “proud” or otherwise hyped the lens or the pictures I posted), then attack me for them. Perhaps you have a chip on your shoulder and are taking it out on me? Perhaps feel a bit inferior? I dunno. . All I did is post some pictures of my kid — pictures that I happened to have taken the first time I used a new lens — and posted them for my family to see. You’ve got a real problem. Try a vacation, or something. —Jeffrey

Thank you for your nice reviews. I also have 18-200 with my D40x and considering 17-55 with exactly the same reason you have. I’ve been studying reviews in web and it seems the reputation of 17-55 is amazingly polarized. At least it seems to have quite variation among lenses. One of the reported issues is sharpness. Your pictures taken by 70-200 is just stanningly sharp (albeit the focus problem), while those by 17-55 seem softer. I wonder if you did the same test you did for your 70-200. What is your opinion about overall picture quality of 17-55? Is brightness the only advantage over 18-200?

— comment by
susumu
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January 5th, 2008
at
11:48amJST(11 years ago)
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You are right about the extra aperture, just that little bit makes all of the difference. I do the same thing as you do with the lenses (just on a Canon instead :p).

I love reading your posts, they are providing me with a lot of information.